Film and Media Atlas

How Stories Are Broadcast
Sign In
Text size
100%
Theme
Concept

Multiple-language version

Film Industry

A multiple-language version film, or MLV, was a motion picture produced in several languages for different national markets, mainly during the early sound era, by reusing the same sets, props and costumes while casting different, linguistically appropriate actors for each version and sometimes altering the script or scenes. The practice began in 1929 and quickly displaced the earlier international sound version method, with English, Spanish, French and German the most common languages used. It declined within a few years because of the added production cost and complexity, and had largely died out by the 1950s in most markets because of improvements in dubbing and subtitling, though India continued making such versions sporadically. This description is adapted from Wikipedia contributors under CC BY-SA 4.0; changes were made. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

Facts
Concept Domain
Film Production 1
Formulated Year
1929 1
Domain
Domain (category)
Film 1
Connections

In Medium

Film, Media Forms
Sources
1. Multiple-language version (Wikipedia)
  • introductory section
    To offset the marketing restrictions of making sound films in only one language, it became common practice for American and European studios to produce foreign-language versions of their films using the same sets, crew, costumes, etc but often with different actors fluent in each language.
  • History section
    The first foreign-language versions appeared in 1929 and largely replaced the International Sound Version method for many major releases.
View the Source
Comments (0)
No comments yet. Be the first to share a thought.
Reader Challenges (0)
No disputes yet. Spotted an error or a better source? Open the first one.